As the saying goes, ‘You can’t be everything to everyone.’

This saying rings true also in your professional life as a lawyer whose focus is to run a successful firm. If you try to attract everyone to your practice, you may attract no one. Instead, you have to target the people you most want as clients.

Welcome to Gimbal’s Tip of the Week, where you get practical, actionable advice you can use right away to start building a more productive and profitable legal practice.

This week’s tip is to identify exactly who your ideal client is.

People are usually concerned that they will automatically eliminate all other potential clients if they identify their ideal target audience and only market to a very narrow group. In reality, you will eliminate some (the ones you probably don't want anyway), but others will still be attracted to you even though they are not EXACTLY your target.

If you try to serve everyone, your message will be too general, and the systems you put in place won’t necessarily work.

For example, if you’re going for start-ups in a particular sector and have a compelling message, you'll likely get interest from people who may not technically be start-ups but who are still early in their development or who are start-ups in a related sector. Then you can decide whether you want to serve them or refer them.

Your action item this week is to use our Ideal Client Worksheet to help you identify your ideal client avatar (ICA). The worksheet is quite detailed and specific so set aside some time this week to get it done.

You can also create different ICAs for your different practice areas if applicable.

Once you know who your ideal client is, you can:

•  Compete more effectively by being specialized and known as the go-to person for that particular work
•  Tailor your marketing, communication, and services to attract the right people
•  Optimize your business development efforts and your budget
•  Reduce the wasted time and effort that would otherwise be spent screening

Today, download the Ideal Client Worksheet and get that much closer to identifying the perfect clients for your firm.

Taking the time to identify your ideal clients will build a more fulfilling practice and achieve greater profits with less effort. Put simply, you’d be much more likely to stand out and attract the right clients to keep your funnel full.

Join us for next week’s Tip of the Week on building a profitable and productive law practice.